Game of Thrones: The Red Woman – Review

Game of Thrones: The Red Woman (Season 6, Episode 1)

“Jon was my friend. And those fuckers butchered him. Now we return the favour.”

It’s baaaaaaack. Where do I even begin with this episode? The first episode of the new season re-introduced us to what was happening in and around Westeros and there were about seven different stories in play so let’s go chronologically.

Jury’s out: Jon Snow is dead (at least, for now). Ser Alliser has taken over the Night’s Watch with only Davos and a few members of the Watch standing against him although it looks as though the tiny resistance may be trying to enlist the help of the Wildlings. This was probably the most boring story of the episode but that’s just because it was a great episode. With this divide at Castle Black the season is shaping up so that there may be another battle of epic proportions in the North. Especially if Jon is resurrected. Please bring back Jon Snow. Please.

Moving a bit further south, we saw Ramsay in the wake of his battle against Stannis’ army as he mourned the death of his partner in torture, Myranda. The word ‘mourned’ makes it seem as though Ramsay is a remotely sympathetic character so I feel like it’s important to note that he was happy to feed her dead body to the dogs. First Jon, then Myranda: there was a lot of looking over dead bodies this episode.

Then we saw Sansa and Theon fleeing from Ramsay’s men. From this episode it looks as though this season we’re going to be seeing Theon rather than Reek which should be interesting as far as the development of his relationship with Sansa goes (he destroyed her home). They were rescued by Brienne and Podrick which led to a very emotional exchange in which Sansa accepted Brienne’s help. We saw how incredibly broken and removed Sansa was from her past life as a noble which was heart-breaking. People talk a lot about Sansa’s development but we really saw the cost at which that came.

Jaime returned to King’s Landing with the body of his dead daughter which triggered the strangest feeling within me. I pitied Cersei? After the Shame Walk last season, I opened my heart up a bit to Cersei and I couldn’t help but feel her pain this time around. Perhaps this season will mean a redemption arc for both Theon and Cersei.

In Dorne the Sand Snakes killed the men and basically took the nation for themselves. I have no idea where that’s going but I’m a fan of them all the same.

Tyrion and Varys walked around a derelict Meereen and had large-scale discussions as Varys does in all of his scenes. The situation seems fraught to say the least and we did not get to see Grey Worm or Missandei but the overwhelming feeling was that Meereen is currently a power vacuum. Who is going to rise up and take it? The owners? The slaves? Tyrion?

Daario Naharis and Jorah went in search of Dany only to discover that she had been taken by Dothraki (I could have told you that, guys) but we did get a reminder that Jorah was slowly being infected by greyscale from the Stone Men. How many more episodes do you think it will be before he goes rabid and attacks Daario?

Who knew that the Dothraki would be the funniest part of the show? I certainly wouldn’t have guessed it but here we are. Dany was delivered to a Khal and managed to save herself from another marriage but after revealing herself to be the widow of Khal Drogo it looks like she will be making a one-way trip to Vaes Dothrak (essentially a Dothraki retirement village of ex-Khaleesis).

Finally, we returned to Castle Black and whilst Davos stalled for time, we saw Melisandre… I have no idea what Melisandre was doing. She was naked and young, then she was naked and old. She looked sad? For an episode called The Red Woman, the Red Woman storyline was surprisingly unclear.

Overall, I think that this was a great start to the new season and I can’t wait for more – obviously, you can come back here every Monday to hear what I thought about the new episode but until then:

What did you think of Game of Thrones? What was your favourite story-line? Who do you think will die next? Let me know in the comments.